


All In Good Time

by MistressAkira



Series: Life Goes On: Vignettes of Fate [2]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Implied Sexual Content, Jakob is a jerk, M/M, No Specified Path, No Spoilers, Re:edited as of 8/9/2016, Vague descriptions of violence, Vignette, and Silas is wonderful, gender-neutral corrin, this is rarepair hell, this was the promised gay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-29
Updated: 2016-07-29
Packaged: 2018-07-27 11:50:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7616977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressAkira/pseuds/MistressAkira
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Patience is a virtue, though not one either of them seem to possess. Still Silas will wait for him... he waited all these years to find Corrin again, he can wait for Jakob.<br/>---<br/>It started with the words "I love you", and ended with "What now?". A series of vignettes showcasing the various firsts of their relationship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All In Good Time

**Author's Note:**

> welcome to part two of: I WILL GO DOWN WITH THIS SHIP.
> 
> Side note, I actually began writing this before In Bloom, but ended up rewriting several scenes and got behind, so I finished In Bloom first. ~(=o=)~ Also this was inspired by their S support in UnassumingVenasuar's gay fates hack, and I literally borrowed the first two pieces of dialogue from it.
> 
> I own a very cheap fan that miraculously keeps me cool during the summer months. I do not own Fire Emblem.

The first time they meet, Silas is just this side of eighteen and Jakob is twenty-four. They meet side and side with Corrin, Silas smiling and offering a hand to shake and Jakob looking like he’d rather die than shake it.

Their first conversation is short and curt, and leaves Silas positive he’d never like a guy like that; he figures the feeling is mutual. And that will never change.

* * *

 

A year and a half later, it did change. Somewhat.

Over a year of being side and side, sharing space, sharing the day-to-day, sharing the blood, sweat, and tears of the battlefield, a young Silas, stupidly thinking he was in love for the first time says _I love you_ , and Jakob does not say it back.

But Silas understands; the _HOW DARE YOU?!_ spat back at him is one more of embarrassment and surprise rather than actual anger. Jakob storms away, but Silas smiles fondly at him as he strides off. _One day_ , he’ll show Silas he has feelings like any other human being, and it’s a fond thought. The fact that the words fond and Jakob could be associated together is a miracle in and of itself.

Patience is a virtue, though not one either of them seem to possess.

Still Silas will wait for him to say it back (Heaven forbid he says it before he’s ready, and doesn’t mean it). He waited all these years to find Corrin again, he can wait for Jakob.

* * *

 

The first time they hold hands, it’s when they've been _together_ for two months - far too soon to be considered anything more-Jakob is on mess hall duty, and Silas has poked his head in to see what he was doing.

But Jakob doesn’t look up from stirring the stew pot when Silas announces his arrival, so Silas picks his way around the barrels of wheat and crates of produce to the stove where Jakob is blatantly ignoring him. At first all he does is hover, but then, quietly slipping closer, Silas goes to rest his head on Jakob’s broad shoulder and slips his gloved hand in the butler’s own.

He can feel the other man’s body go completely stiff in an instant, and for an aching second, Silas thinks he’ll pull away. But Jakob doesn’t. His gauntlet covered fingers align themselves with Silas’ carefully, and holds fast as he never looks away from the stove, only tuts with aggravation that is only _mostly_  real.

* * *

 

The first time they kiss is after a long, grueling battle, when they've been _together_ three months and one week; Silas is propped up on his horse, ankle injured from a well-aimed axe, Jakob tending to the wound. Silas is sweaty and achy, desperate to plod off on his horse to go see if Corrin’s okay, to see if his comrades are okay, when Jakob appears from the crowd of healers and those being healed; he makes some rude, derogatory comment about something or another, but Silas is too weary for it to register until Jakob has his hands on Silas’s knee and is pressing a healing staff to the wound.

It’s then that the two meet each other’s gaze, and something like a spark sizzles under Silas's skin; Silas is saying how sorry he is he got hurt, and Jakob is clucking his tongue and saying it could have been worse, but the worry in his tone is there and Silas can’t help but notice it.

Steeling his determination, Silas leans down from his horse, moving towards the butler with clear intent; he’s giving Jakob a chance to pull away if he’s not ready. But Jakob doesn’t make a move to shift away, instead tilting his head slightly when Silas is finally near him enough for their lips to touch. The kiss is light, fleeting, and Silas is pulling away before he falls off his horse and onto Jakob from exhaustion. Jakob only blinks before finishing tending to Silas’s wound, smiling coyly as he walks away to see to the others.

* * *

 

The first time they get a chance to spar since getting together, Silas holds back and Jakob does not. Jakob wins the first round and Silas stops going easy on him. Silas wins the second round. Jakob looks mortified and redoubles his efforts. He wins the third round. He also wins the fourth.

* * *

 

The first time someone finds out about them, _together_ , it’s Corrin, and Jakob abruptly faints.

And shortly after, Silas decides it's time they're more than just _together._ He decides they are now a couple, and Jakob is incapacitated at the moment and unable to dispute it.

* * *

 

The first time they make love, Jakob is twenty-six and Silas is twenty. Jakob feels like a cradle robber and says so before he faints again when they’re done.

The next morning, no one really wakes up first, but rather they’re both used to rising early that they are just suddenly not asleep anymore, staring at each other in bleary wonder. Jakob’s hair ribbon is nowhere to be found. His shoulder-length locks of grey hair are a tangled, sweaty, nappy mess on the pillow, his lips kiss-swollen. Silas eyes are red, he has skin under his fingernails, and his bed-head has crossed over into a new dimension of ruined.

Jakob is almost grimacing and Silas is almost embarrassed, but in that too-early-for-light morning moment the tension of _Did we really just do that?_ is broken. They scoot closer until they are chest to chest, arms and legs tangling around each other like roots of two trees, always in the same forest but only just now reaching each other for the first time, away from the rustling chatter and shifting storms of real life. Silas tucks Jakob’s head in the crook of his neck.

They lay like that until Jakob must get up to go tend to Corrin.

* * *

 

The first time they’re caught in public, Silas is holding both of Jakob’s hands in his own, and it’s in the middle of the training ground. (Obviously, they’re not _really_ trying to hide it anymore; they've been a _couple_ nearly a year now.)

Silas almost absentmindedly places a kiss on Jakob’s cheek, and the grounds light up suddenly with laughter and cheers as all eyes are on the knight and butler. There are the people who are shocked, the few who scoff, but the vast majority are startled yet happy for them. Jakob’s face is the color of murder, but Silas is only grinning when the whistles and _Get a room!_ s start, his smile threatening to tear ear to ear when someone else chimes in, _They did get a room, couldn’t you hear them the other night!_

Jakob throws a dagger that conveniently misses someone’s head. Silas just laughs and kisses him again.

* * *

 

The first time they have a fight- a real fight, not just Jakob being overly cynical or Silas being overly sensitive- it’s not about the war, it’s not even about Corrin, it’s about marriage.

They are twenty-seven and twenty-one, and Jakob feels too old for this.

Half of the other couples in the army have started tying the knots as of late while they still can, and the other half is contemplating it. Silas brings it up offhand one night in his room, where Jakob is polishing his gauntlet to a blinding shine, but actually drops both the armor and the cup of tea he’s drinking when the words leave Silas’s mouth.

The cup shatters when it hits the ground and the gauntlet lands with a clang _,_ rolling under the bed. Jakob’s face is all too pleasant when he gets down to retrieve the armor piece.

 _Why?_ he asks nonchalantly.

Silas’s face heats as his knees hit the floor to help clean up the broken tea cup, but Jacob is already done, and Silas feels stupid and hurt all over again as he stiffly stands back up. The butler returns to the bed to tend to the scratches now etched in his gauntlet, Silas still standing in the middle of the room.

 _Because I love you._ Silas says with heartbreaking earnesty. 

Jakob starts by scoffing, saying that there’s no reason for Silas to get all attached now; _I’m not that easily made to swoon._ Silas tries again, being honest about why the others are in a rush to get married. Jakob negates this by saying he’ll never marry unless Corrin decrees him to; Silas doesn’t think getting Corrin’s blessing would be too hard, and says so. Jakob points out how much older than Silas he is, practically his cradle robber; Silas groans and tells him to stop- _there's six years between us, not sixty._ Jakob's face is still placid when he says such a thing would be a hassle: _we’ll do it together,_ Silas insists. Jakob insists he’ll never do it, _he doesn’t want to._

They continue to argue, Jakob’s responses getting colder and colder as Silas’s grow hotter and more passionate, and then the tension snaps when Jakob does.

He stands up from where he’s sitting on the bed to hiss at Silas to mind his own business, _I’m not one of those pathetic mongrels always crying to you about their problems, who need you to save them._ He walks to the door, not offering where he intends to go, closing it quietly behind him- it’s so _Jakob_ of him, Silas wishes he’d slammed the door, just so that he knows that he’s not the only one distraught over this.

But Jakob doesn’t come back the rest of the night.

And Silas sinks his head into his hands.

* * *

It’s not the first time they’ve had sex, but it is the first time Jakob has ever said he loves Silas out loud.

The room is hot and stuffy, the smell of the act lingering, and Jakob is lying an arm’s length away when he says those three words quietly, _I love you._

Silas isn’t too exhausted to be surprised, his eyes darting to Jakob’s sprawled out form across the bed from him. Just a few days ago, they were having the worst fight of their lives- about spending the _rest of their lives_ together- and now, Jakob is saying _I love you_ like it means both _I love you_ and _sorry I wasn’t honest._

It’s not a revelation; Silas knows Jakob loves him. He didn’t have to say it out loud, he said it in all the little things he’d done: ironing Silas’s shirts in the morning before treating his lord’s, bringing Silas pots of coffee on the nights he was on the late watch shift, the way he stopped hiding the fact they held hands when they sit next to each other at meetings, how he whispers Silas’s name when he comes. It’s not a revelation, but Silas feels like he’s waited forever to hear these words; they've been a couple one year and nine months, and that has become forever in Silas' opinion.

Stretching his hand over to meet Jakob’s, Silas interlocks their fingers like they had that first time in the mess hall what felt like years ago.

_I love you too._

Jakob’s gaze shifts over to meet Silas’s, and for the second time that night it’s another first time when he’s seeing remorse in Jakob’s eyes. Silas doesn’t wait, he’s pulling Jakob to him, wrapping his arms around the butler’s broad yet slender form and crushing him into a hug. Jakob stiffens but then he’s hiding his face in his matted hair, looking everywhere but his lover, but Silas is lifting his chin up with his sword calloused hands and presses their lips together again and again and again until Jakob can barely remember his name and he can only taste, touch, smell Silas.

 _I love you,_ the knight whispers again.

 _Is that so?_ the butler whispers back.

They are officially lovers now, Silas thinks.

* * *

 

The first time one of them almost dies, it’s Jakob. Two years together, four years of existing in the same plane, twenty-eight and twenty-two years old, and it's Jakob who almost dies.

It’s Jakob when he’s diving to shield Corrin from a blow that would have separated their head clean from their shoulders, shattering Jakob instead.

Silas sees Corrin carrying the butler back to camp on the dragon’s shoulders, and it doesn’t register what happened until Jakob’s body is sliding ragdollish to the ground and the healers are on him like flies to a corpse. Then Silas is jumping off his horse and launching himself in the direction of the healer’s tent, chasing them inside, followed closely by Corrin. They can only hover for a moment to observe the damage before being unceremoniously shoved out into the outside cold. They are told to wait.

Silas does not want to wait. Not when the man he loves is dying meters away, and _he can’t even be near him._ Corrin runs off to tend to the rest of army, but Silas doesn’t move. He only sinks to the ground, curling into a ball with his head between his legs in fear and sorrow. He can’t breathe, he can’t think, he can’t do anything for what feels like hours.

Silas only moves when he’s alerted Jakob is stable for now, and when he moves it’s to go hug his best friend. Silas folds Corrin in his arms, whispering how happy he is that Corrin’s alive, how happy everything’s alright. Everything is not alright, but Silas cannot be mad at Jakob for doing his duty and taking the blow for his master, and he cannot be mad at Corrin for getting themselves into a situation that required Jakob to do what had to be done for them to survive. He cannot be mad at anyone, so Silas just holds his best friend close.

In the interim of the fateful battle, there is nothing to do but pick up the pieces as the army puts itself back together in the wakes of those lost and almost-lost. There is nothing for Silas to do but wait for Jakob to wake up again, and he refuses to sit around drowning in the thoughts of _what-if_ , so he throws himself into aiding anyone he can in the aftermath.

Felicia can cover most of Jakob’s butlerly duties, and other than a caution for broken dishes, Corrin resumes running the army as if nothing happened. Silas is at their side more often than not, picking up the scrapes of every little bit of work he can. And when he is not, he’s doing every chore known to man, in every part of camp except the medical tent.

This goes on for four days. Silas works himself into an exhausted haze and he does not go visit Jakob in the infirmary. There’d be no point, he hadn’t stirred in days, and Silas doesn’t think he could be able to sit there, staring at what would be Jakob’s dead body if it wasn’t for the slight breaths he drew with ragged lungs. Silas can hear his voice in everything he does, griping when Silas misses part of the mess hall when mopping, cooing at him to wake up earlier or waste the day asleep like a bump on a log, whispering him all manner of _things_ when he really should be doing inventory but finds himself crouched on the ground when fear, vicious and cold, seeps in his bones and losing Jakob seems unbearable.

But on the dawn of the fifth day the spell is broken. Corrin personally goes to tell Silas that Jacob has woken up, and for the knight, it’s like the first time the sun has risen in days. He runs to the infirmary as fast as he can, and is bursting through the tent flap in a flurry of arms and legs.

Jakob is sitting up in the tiny cot, looking like he’d died- _almost-_ with his ragged hair, white bandages dyed red covering his neck, arms, and torso, and bags under his slate grey eyes. Eyes that are unfocused as they turn to look at Silas throwing himself through the tent door. Silas can only stare at him for a moment before launching himself at the bed, and despite barreling into the metal frame and crashing onto the mattress, he reaches Jakob and throws his arms around the butler.

Jakob gasps in pain as Silas crushes him in his grip, his forehead falling to Jakob’s shoulder as he revels in the breathing, bleeding, warm person underneath him. Silas doesn’t lessen his grip even the slightest when Jakob’s ragged breathing fills his ears, and he just holds him.

He doesn’t say anything in return, and once his breathing returns to normal, Jakob is tentatively putting his arms around Silas’s shoulders, and together they hold each other in silence. Silas cries silent, previously unshed tears into Jakob’s stained and ruined uniform, and his lover doesn’t berate him about it. Instead Jakob holds him closer.

* * *

 

And then in one decisive battle, the war is over, their enemies lie in bloody heaps on the ground while they stand victorious, and they have been together- a couple, lovers, in love- two years and four months of the five years the war lasted.

Silas is leaning his head into the neck of his horse, telling her what a good job she did as he stroked her sweat-matted mane. Jakob is a short distance over, and then he’s dragging Silas into a hug the moment the knight’s feet touch the ground, the one being crushed in the other’s grip now Silas. The other couples of the army are doing the same thing, clumps of sighing, laughing, hugging people reveling in the knowledge that they are alive, _this is over._

Silas pulls Jakob from his chest and crashes their lips together, kissing him and kissing him; _they’re alive, it’s over._

It’s two days later, when the previous battle has been slept off, the stores of food have been nearly emptied in an impromptu feast, and the dead have been buried, that the first time the question is asked, _What do we do now?_

It’s spoken by Silas to Jakob that morning at breakfast, and Jakob has no response. Neither does Silas. The two sit in silence, spooning but not really eating their food, and no one can come up with an answer to that question.

_What do we do now?_

In the days that follow, the question is traded again and again between comrades, and every time Silas hears it he still has no answer.

Jakob loves Corrin, and will follow them wherever the dragon noble will go, but that is debatable where exactly. Silas loves Nohr, and will go back to it because he is a knight and it is his duty.

But Jakob loves Silas and Silas loves Jakob, so what are they to do?

* * *

 

The answer comes to Silas a few days before the army is set to leave for the real world, a week since their final battle, and it is the first time Silas properly proposes to Jakob. One knee to the ground, ring in hand, he takes Jakob’s hand in their quarters and asks Jakob to marry him.

The butler is in a state of bewilderment, and instead of a yes or a no, he instead asks if Silas has hit his head on something sharp and lost all the memories of the past two and a half years. Silas denies any head trauma and asks again, to which Jakob tells him, _No, you foolish man._

Silas is crestfallen, but in a moment of pessimism he wonders what he was expecting. Jakob was a stubborn man who had said his piece on the subject before, and it had almost broken them then. But a small voice inside Silas is fearing that their inevitable separation would only lead to a further breakdown of their relationship, and Jakob would give up on him. Or worse, get swept up in the arms of someone else. It’s this doubt that leads Silas to his next approach to getting Jakob to accept his proposal.

The next day, he seeks out Corrin, finding them in their tree house, packing up boxes of all the various trinkets they’d acquired through the five years the army has called the Astral Plane home. Silas watches with somber eyes as Corrin slides a shelf of multi-colored stones into a box, following them with a _sakura_ flower that had been dried from Corrin’s time at Castle Shirasagi and the hard clay rocks they had brought from Nohr. He takes a deep breath, and asks his friend for his butler’s hand in marriage.

Corrin stops picking books from a shelf to turn and look at Silas. The knight looks back with nervous hope in his eyes, and there is a bubble in his chest where his heart should be.

The dragon sighs, coming over to sit across from him at the little eating table where Silas nurses a cup of coffee, and the two share a moment of silence enjoying Jakob’s freshly made brew. It’s not the best either of them have had, but that’s not the point that crosses Silas’s mind as Corrin absentmindedly stirs in more sugar into their cup.

Corrin sits up a bit when it appears they’re finally ready to answer, and looking Silas dead in the eyes, Corrin says:

_No._

Corrin actually says that they will not speak for Jakob in any way in a situation such as this, and as much as Silas can respect that, his heart still sinks. Corrin goes on to say that they know how the two feel about each other, but in the end, it’s Jakob’s decision to make. Silas is smiling bitterly when he nods his head and goes to leave.

That was the second time he had asked for Jakob’s hand, and the second time he was refused.

Early the next morning, the day they are to leave and go their separate ways, Silas asks him a third time in that darkness. Or rather, he’s begging, pleading for Jakob to accept.

This time he is not met with immediate rebuttal, but rather silence. Silas fears he has pushes him too far before Jakob is rolling over in his arms and turning to face him. His voice is clear when he asks, _Why do you feel the incessant need to put a ring on my finger? Do you need help remembering I’m yours?_ He scoffs and his voice gets sharper as he continues, _How many others are you trying to keep wrapped around your little finger? Plenty, I’m sure with how popular you are._

Silas doesn’t have the will to respond to the jab. He just pulls Jakob closer and begs him again to reconsider. _I love you, I just want to love you,_ he whispers sadly.

 _Are you afraid that once we’re separated, I’ll forget you? Fall out of love, as it were?_ Silas can’t speak as Jakob nonchalantly voices his greatest fears as if they were nothing. His heart drops to his stomach and he concedes, _yes_ , yes that’s exactly what he thinks will happen.

 _I told you once, so I’ll tell you again, seeing as that’s the only way you hear me._ Jakob twists in their arms so that they are nose to nose, the butler’s hands on Silas’s chin. _I’m not that easily made to swoon. You’ve gone and made me love you, and now you’re stuck with me. That will not change, be it we are miles away, worlds away, or just down the hall from each other. I swear to it._

Silas’s breath is caught in his throat and Jakob’s face is smiling its familiar smirk of victory. In just those few words, Silas’s fears are dust in the wind, and when this man promises him his love, it’s like they never existed in the first place.

 _Yes, okay. Alright._ Silas mumbles right against Jakob’s lips.

In the remaining few hours of darkness, the two enjoy their last morning together in each other's embrace, and once the sun rises, they are collecting their things and parting ways.

* * *

 

The first time they meet again after the war, it’s been several months. Eight months to be exact; Silas's birthday has come to pass again, and now he is twenty-three years old. Despite at least feeling a bit more mature, he is a ball of nervous, excited, elated energy as he parts ways with his swords, helmet, and cape- he is a commander now after all- and is ushered to Corrin’s personal chambers. The clink of his boots on the floor can’t drown out the anxious thumping of Silas’s heart when he knocks on the door and waits.

Jakob answers the door and Silas’s heart drops. He is a year older, one less between them numerically but nearly a year standing between them physically. Their gazes meet and there’s a chill running through Silas when he sees ice in his stare.

Corrin is oblivious to it as he calls Silas into the room, rounding him up in a great big hug. This is also the first time Corrin and Silas have seen each other since the war, but Silas’s eyes are on Corrin’s butler as he slinks to the corner of the room to be a silent observer.

Corrin regales Silas of all the things that have happened since the two have spoken last, _the reconstruction, the new policies, the marriages._ Silas half-listens for what feels like hours as he numbly drinks the tea Jakob serves him at arm’s length and watches him out of the corner of his eye. Then it seems he blinks and Corrin is excusing themselves, leaving the two in silence save for the closing door.

Silas spins stiffly to find Jakob, whom he spots once again haunting the corner of the room near one of the bookcases. They stare at each other, both searching the other’s face for something they don’t even know how to place.

Together, a couple, lovers, in-love?

Jakob approaches him first, teapot in hand, which he sets on the table but does not sit down. The chill between them is palatable, and Silas bites his lip.

 _Took your sweet time getting around to visit, didn’t you? My master has been beside themselves looking forward to seeing you again._ Jakob states dryly.

Silas is positive Jakob is not referring to Corrin in this instance. _I’m sorry, but my new duties got the better of me. Please give your master by deepest condolences, and know… that I wasn’t sure what they would think of me by the time I finally showed up._

Jakob looks bitter and he crosses his arms as he turns away from Silas to avoid showing him his face. _We thought you would have visited sooner- and never again question if you are welcome here. When a butler swears an oath, we follow it dutifully. Ask my master if you need further confirmation._

_That makes me happy… that Corrin feels that way, I mean._

_Oh shut up._

Jakob turns and is hauling Silas up into a kiss that melts the cold in Silas’s bones. Hands in hair, they’re on each other, laughs and whispers and kisses mixing into one.

 _I missed you. So, so much._ Silas murmurs into the butler’s hair.

Jakob responds by grabbing Silas’s arm again and yanks him through the door at the far end of the room, and together they stumble though the hallway beyond until they end up at a nondescript door that Jakob pushes him through.

Silas gets a moment to take in the surroundings- books on cooking, stain removal, classic literature stacked on a desk, a sewing kit tucked under a shelf, a gauntlet polished to so bright a shine that the deep scratch on it is invisible unless one knows it’s there- before he’s shoved to the bed and further mauled by Jacob.

They kiss a while longer and then Silas is pressing a hand to his lover’s chest and holding him there. _This is the first time I’ve ever seen your room._

Jakob actually laughs at that before closing Silas in between his arms. _There’s a first time for everything. All in good time, my dear Silas._

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! (/°v°)/ ❤
> 
> p.s. Jakob is a fucking bitch to write


End file.
